﻿Political Watch 4/10/14

• A bill co-sponsored by State Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara) to prohibit forced or coerced sterilization in state prisons passed out of the Senate Health Committee on April 2 in a unanimous, bipartisan vote of 9-0. The Senate Bill is a response to media reports from the Center for Investigative Reporting last year that revealed coercive sterilization of female inmates was occurring as late as 2010 at the Central California Women’s Facility and Valley State Prison for Women. Kelli Dillon, who experienced sterilization at the age of 24 while in a California prison, testified at the April 2 hearing. “I’m hoping that by telling my story, I can help prevent others from having their opportunity to be a mother taken away or decided for them,” Dillon said in a press release from Jackson’s office. Dillon works in Los Angeles as a domestic violence counselor and gang interventionist. “When you hear stories like Kelli’s, it’s clear that we need to do more to make sure that forced or coerced sterilizations never occur in our prisons again,” Jackson said in the press release. “Pressuring a vulnerable population into making permanent reproductive choices without informed consent violates our most basic human rights.” This bill would add a section to the penal code to prohibit sterilization in correctional facilities for the purposes of birth control, except in cases where a person’s life is in danger or the procedure is needed to treat a medical condition. The bill now heads over to the Senate Public Safety Committee.

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